Email this article to a friend

your email

your name

recipient(s) email (comma separated)

message

captcha

The 2018 midterm elections saw mixed results for progressives. Democrats took the House of Representatives, which will include a crop of new members who ran on issues like Medicare for All, marijuana legalization and urgent climate action. Democratic socialists also had a big night, winning elections up and down the ballot.

Yet progressive gubernatorial candidates Andrew Gillum and Ben Jealous lost, the outcome of Stacey Abrams’ historic bid for Georgia governor remains up in the air, and Republicans increased their majority in the Senate. While several insurgent left Democrats like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley cruised to victory, others like Jess King and Randy Bryce suffered defeats.

So what lessons should progressives learn from Tuesday’s elections? We asked eight important thinkers on the left for their strategic takeaways from the midterms.

The 2018 elections—both primary and general—mark a remarkable new beginning for the progressive movement. Around the country, we saw hundreds of people inspired by Sen. Bernie Sanders run for office at every level. While many of them did not win this time, they softened the soil for future progressive victories, much like Sen. Sanders’ early runs.

For our part at Our Revolution, we are very proud of our nearly 200 endorsed candidates and over 40 ballot measures. Our candidates reflected the communities where we see a future progressive electorate. Over half were women and/or people of color. Many were first-time candidates and one out of eight had been a Bernie Sanders 2016 delegate. Nurturing and training these candidates for future elections is a critical role that Our Revolution will continue to undertake with our allies.

Reflecting on the midterms, we see that the campaigns we backed have already made history and will continue to do so. Candidates like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib became the first Muslim women elected to Congress. Deb Haaland is one of the first Indigenous women elected to Congress. And in addition to sweeping in a diverse group of candidates to Congress, we’ve also helped change the electorate in Florida by expanding ballot access to 1.5 million people who have already paid their debt to society.

No matter what the final election results, we believe that the candidates we endorsed have helped to activate millions of voters and advanced the interests of working people. As we await potential recounts and runoffs in Florida and Georgia, we must take stock of the racism and voter suppression surrounding these elections and seriously consider who we are as a country.

On balance, we are in a slightly stronger position than before the election, after some great victories and some heartbreaking defeats. I see three key lessons.

Collaborating with white nationalists and neofascists is unacceptable, for both moral and strategic reasons. Our work, as always, is building a coalition of poor and working class people of all colors, made possible because the capitalists are waging ever more open class warfare. Yet this task is made difficult in a country built on stolen land and slave labor, where there is little effective Democratic response to blatant Republican voter suppression or organization of white working class women in their own economic interest.

Republicans read the tea leaves and understood that health care was the biggest issue for voters, borne out by the exit polls, so they ran claiming they would protect it. Voters in Idaho, Montana and Utah overrode their Republican state leadership and expanded Medicaid

Democrats need to not only double down on Medicare for All, they need to make it their signature issue and clarify that we’re talking about the real Medicare for All, not watered down copycat plans that maintain a role for the private insurance and pharmaceutical industries. Yet because that is precisely who funds Wall Street Democrats, it will be up to the grassroots to create the political conditions necessary on the ground to make that happen, by organizing our neighbors.

We must lead with hope. In the now Democratic-controlled House, democratic socialist women of color Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib will be critical new voices joining Bernie Sanders in the Senate raising a visionary alternative to both Trumpism and neoliberal bipartisanship.

Unions, in the midst of a massive strike wave, must rise to the occasion as the single most effective mass vehicle for raising expectations and building organized multi-racial working-class solidarity and power, in and outside the formal political system.

And Democratic Socialists of America chapters in all 50 states will systematically organize their communities—rural, suburban and urban. Together, we have a world to win.

Rick Perlstein, historian and author of The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan

The reporting of the election returns coming on Tuesday was surreally and tragically incomplete. We hung on every word in down-to-the-wire races. In Florida, the governor and Senate races were supposedly decided by something like 51,000 votes and 20,000 votes out about eight million cast. In Georgia, Stacey Abrams is asking for a recount after coming 1.6 percentage points short.

Did you hear a single word on TV late last night, however, about the black precincts in Georgia where officials didn’t supply power cords for the voting machines? The batteries died, and people had to wait for hours to vote.

You and I know that the guy running the election in Georgia, Brian Kemp, was also the Republican running for governor in Georgia. Not including an ongoing tabulation of how many votes were being suppressed along with how many were cast is derelict.

So what is the lesson for progressives? The same one I proposed back in 2006, when it was already apparent that the Republican’s long-term strategy was holding control of government whether they had a majority of the voters or not. That year, among the cheating tactics were voters being deluged with fake robocalls, homeless men hired to distribute flyers intended to trick black voters into thinking the Republican candidate was actually the Democrat, a campaign office sabotaged by a skunk, and calls placed from the “Virginia Elections Commission” alerting recipients “you will not be allowed to cast your vote on Tuesday. If you do show up, you will be charged criminally.”

Twelve years ago, I wrote: “From now on there should be no excuse: anticipating such inevitabilities has to be made an active part of Democratic strategizing.” Start now, because we sure as hell didn’t start then.

Barbara Ransby, Distinguished Professor of African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago and author of Making All Black Lives Matter: Reimagining Freedom in the Twenty-First Century

We should have gone into this election with two understandings. One is that no victory and no defeat is ever absolute. The second is that electoral politics is only one arena of struggle. It matters, but not as much as we often think.

Progressives sometimes move opportunistically to the right once in office. And right-wingers can change their tunes if there is enough pressure from the street. Andrew Gillum and Stacey Abrams may not have won their elections, but in trying to get them elected hundreds of thousands of people were energized and set in motion. Movement organizers now need to give them something to do. At the same time, progressives and radicals need to agree on an agenda for the new Democratic majority in the House. That task cannot be left to the politicians. An anti-racist, pro-working class, intersectional feminist analysis has to inform that agenda.

Moreover, key ballot initiatives were won yesterday, most significantly, Proposition 4 in Florida which enfranchised 1.5 million formerly incarcerated citizens with felony convictions, disproportionately poor people and people of color. This is a potential game changer for future elections.

Even though some of the more high profile progressives running for office did not win, there is much work to do to build on the momentum of their campaigns, which is what we should do after any election if we have a “vote PLUS” strategy: Activate databases to invite volunteers into a larger political conversations; plan marches, vigils, direct action tactics that keep up the pressure on both Democrats and Republicans around key issues; re-activate a hearts and minds media campaign to win, defeat or neutralize the underlying racist, elitist, misogynist and xenophobic ideas that feed Trumpism’s reactionary, white nationalist agenda.

The first phase of struggle is the battle of ideas—legislation and elections are metrics that tell us whether we are winning or losing.

1: The Republicans have consolidated as President Trump's party and they are not splitting off. Progressives should not expect any great schisms.

2: Voter suppression is alive and well and appears to have played out in Texas, Georgia and Florida, along with several other states. The active voter suppression was accompanied by racist and xenophobic propaganda at a new scale.

3: Despite the predictable losses in the Senate, Democrats actually did very well, making gains among the poor, women and suburban voters. And many of the newly elected officials seem to illustrate a transitioning Democratic Party.

4: Progressives will need to build independent political organizations that function inside and outside of the Democratic Party in order to sustain the momentum gained from this election and the movement organizing that made it possible.

5: Neofascists are no longer hiding their colors and have used the Trump movement as their “united front” within which they operate and where they seek a certain type of legitimacy. We on the Left must respond with a broad front against right-wing populism that both offers a political and economic alternative while not shying away from directly addressing racism, sexism, religious intolerance and xenophobia.

Ai-jen Poo, senior advisor to Care in Action, the policy and advocacy home for more than two million U.S. domestic workers

The midterm elections—and the months upon months of organizing leading up to it—have absolutely and unequivocally transformed the political landscape for the nation. The Democrats taking back the House is the first step towards building a multiracial democracy that works for everyone. And in Georgia, domestic workers part of Care in Action supported a bold, progressive Black woman for governor, Stacey Abrams, who flipped traditional electoral politics on its head.

Regardless of the result, what we learned is that people are not only ready for change, but that the voters who are normally pushed to the margins are fueling the future of the progressive agenda. Black working women—and Black domestic workers—are writing the blueprint for our future literally from the bottom up.

Domestic workers clocked in countless time and miles to make sure that voters of color were contacted and engaged. The results were incredible. At least 250,000 voters were mobilized, and early voter turnout what 121.2 percent higher than in 2014. With more than 578 canvassers on the ground, Care in Action made 506,315 voter contacts up until the very last moment that polling stations closed.

What happened in Georgia is more than outstanding—it's our movement's roadmap for 2020. And we are still fighting to bring Stacey Abrams to the finish line as remaining provisional ballots continue to be counted.

Low-wage women of color and their leadership powered the blue wave that led to this incredible moment. And this election is just the beginning.

Larry Cohen, Board Chair of Our Revolution and past president of the Communications Workers of America

First, we need to celebrate the resistance—now a political movement—led by women and Black, Brown and White working-class voters, and the new House Democratic majority. But our vision of what is possible means governing more than protesting. We realize that while fighting to protect the Affordable Care Act is important, it is not sufficient. What we need is Medicare for All. We realize we need decent work for all and organizing rights at work as well as a living wage. Overwhelming referendum victories in Florida for “Restoration of Rights” or in Maryland for same-day voter registration show that we can win on issues of democracy. And we realize that the rules matter more than the candidates if we believe that we can win and govern.

We also realize that ours is the only democracy in the world where we overwhelmingly win the representative Congress but don’t govern, because the Senate, elected by a small state minority, can easily block the House agenda, and the President (elected by a minority) and Supreme Court can block them both.

If we believe that we can win and govern at the local, state and federal levels, we need to fight for a real democracy at every level of government and continue the reform efforts in the Democratic Party itself so that the popular vote is what counts in every election. This must include offsetting big money in the party nominating process, as well as in general elections.

Yes, today we celebrate, but tomorrow we focus again on building sustainable political organization inside and outside the Democratic Party, and step by step building a 21st-century democracy that allows us to govern and focus on the issues and vision that make our lives more meaningful as we move forward.

Keeanga-Yahmatta Taylor, assistant professor of African-American Studies at Princeton University, and the author of From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation

The electoral victories that broke the Republican hold on the House of Representative have pierced the perceptions of Trumpism as all powerful and impenetrable. This includes all kinds of progressive referenda, left candidates in state races, and most dramatically, the restoration of voting rights for (most of) the formerly incarcerated in Florida. There were significant victories in the Midwest, where Trump secured his electoral outcome in 2016. These are important repudiations of the white supremacy emanating for the White House. It was also a confirmation of the audience that exists for actual Left politics, not watered down centrism.

Conservative and centrist Democrats found that voters won’t waste their time with cheap knockoffs. The only chance we have to bury the Trump nightmare is a radical political agenda that provides an actual and real alternative to the status quo.

The progressive current within the Democratic Party did not just run against Trump—they ran on Medicare for All, abolition of ICE and other political issues seen as progressive and not just maintenance of the status quo.

Where these politics failed to win, most spectacularly in Florida with Andrew Gillum and possibly with Stacey Abrams in Georgia, the naked racism, voter intimidation, voter suppression and outright theft should not be underestimated. The GOP’s long game of gerrymandering districts and using the courts to undermine easy access to voting will continue to come into play as their message shrinks to its bigoted and maniacal base.

The other truth coming out of the elections is that the need for struggle and organizing remain as important as they have ever been. In the effort to generate the mobilization of voters, that unfortunate narrative reducing nearly all of Black struggle and politics to voting was revived. Of course, securing the right to vote had been a central part of Black political movements since emancipation, but even activists and organizers within the Civil Rights Movement, understood their struggle to be about so much more.

To put it sharply, voting is not enough when the first words from Nancy Pelosi’s upon winning the House of Representatives are her intentions to “reach across the aisle” in hope of attaining “bipartisanship.” It confirms how out of touch the existing Democratic Party leadership is, how little they have learned from 2016 and that struggle remains absolutely critical to making them take the agenda of poor and working-class people in this country seriously. They will not do it on their own.

The growth of the hard right is real. The threat of fascism is real. Climate collapse is real. These all require a qualitative transformation in our political expectations and demands. We have to think big; we have to organize bigger. It requires more than getting out the vote. Now the hard work continues.

Help In These Times Continue Publishing

Progressive journalism is needed now more than ever, and In These Times needs you.

SOCIAL RICHYVAJS-YOU DO SEE THE DEPTH OF YOUR BS-BETTER GET A BIGGER SHOVEL-DIG DEEP INTO YOUR COMMUNISTIC WORLD-YOUR SOCIALIST VALUES WILL TAKE YOU THERE.

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-15 23:29:38

MATT CLEMER, I can't help admiring economists - my Brother is one - until he retired, he was a managing supervisor working for the US Treasury - he was involved in the issuing of Treasury bills/bonds (used for borrowing to cover the deficits). When I asked him how America will plug the one trillion dollar hole left in the federal operating budget from these insane tax cuts for the rich, he just says that he is glad that he is retired and he prefers not to think about financial future of this country because it would keep him up at night. Economists like to consider themselves scientists trying to mathematically connect financial patterns with human and political behavior. Your opinions seem to reflect very uninformed, simplistic explanations of nuanced events. Maybe that is why I am so pessimistic about the current state of America - I at least see the depths of the problems.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-13 06:58:27

RV-R. WOLFFE-A JOURNALIST-MSNBC-COMMENTATOR-FORMER VP @MSNBC MEDIA-ANOTHER MARXIST LOSER & AN INTELLECTUAL IDIOT-YOU SEEM TO ADMIRE ECONOMISTS-THEY'RE BASICALLY OPINIONISTS WHO USE DATA & PREDICT OUTCOMES & THEN CLAIM @ A LATER DATE THAT THE DATA WAS INCORRECT WITHOUT ANY CONSEQUENCES-THE MAJORITY ARE WRONG THE MAJORITY OF THE TIME-NOBEL PRIZES ARE AWARDED BY 12 SWEDISH ELITISTS WHO ARE FAKES-PHONIES & FRAUDS WHO MEET FOR DINNER EVERY THURS. @ RESTAURANTS THAT THEY OWN.

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-13 00:06:49

I basically make almost $21,000-$22,000 every 30 days from the net. I lost my job after working for the same organization for years. I needed reliable source of income. I was not thinking about the "get rich overnight" packages you can see online. Those all are sort of ponzi kind of multilevel marketing plans in which you need to first make prospective buyers then sell something to friends or family members or any individual to make sure they will be in your team. Working over the internet has many positive points like I am always home with the children and also enjoy time with family on different beaches of the world. Here's the ultimate way to start BEWTRACT.TUMBLR.COM

Posted by Lynette J. Lew on 2018-11-12 11:42:21

I've read his article on inequality - seemed objective enough. He did win the Nobel Prize in Economics (which is probably a lot more harder to win than the Nobel Prize for Peace). And he is not the only economist sounding an alarm - you should hear Dr. Richard Wolffe sometime - he'd set your hair on fire.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-12 08:20:43

MATT CLEMER,Let me enlighten you about "long term care insurance" - first off it will cost you about several hundred a month and then when you need it - it won't kick in for 6 months and then it ends in about 2 1/2 years - so it really only provides two actual years of care. I also was a Libertarian for years - I ran for Congress as a Libertarian in 1994 - only to be denied ballot access by Florida law. To get ballot access, you either needed to pay about $10,000 or get 3% of the registered voters in your political party to petition for you to be on the ballot. For Democrats and Republicans that was only 3% of the Democrats or Republicans in your congressional district. For third party candidates, you needed 3% of ALL of the voters. not just 3% of the Libertarians I managed to get about 2% of all voters and had to pay $10,000. Based upon my "injury", civil rights lawyers were able to soften Florida's law. But the elites who run our two parties will never let up. I am now a Democratic Socialist - I see how capitalism is now failing. I, also remember my parents generation and how the socialistic New Deal saved them.Don't let the Rush Limbaughs feed you baloney. The Canadians love their socialist medical care system and the Scandinavians and the Germans feel fortunate with their socialist worker-friendly systems.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-12 07:34:55

RV-HOPEFULLY IT WILL BANKRUPT THAT HUNGARIAN COMMUNIST WHO WILL TRY TO DESTROY THIS COUNTRY WITH HIS GLOBAL VISIONS & DIRTY ASS MONEY TO CREATE THE DIVISION OF THE COUNTRY-THE DEMOTURDS MOTTO IS INVESTIGATE NOT LEGISLATE HIS GLOBAL VISION IS PURE BS-ALREADY EURO COUNTRIES ARE REGRETTING THEIR DECISION-NOT ITALY OR GREECE-HOW MANY TIMES HAVE THEY BEEN BAILED OUT ALREADY? SOCIALISM AT WORK-GOOD LUCK WITH THAT!

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 19:15:59

RV-I FEEL WHAT YOU ARE GOING THRU WITH YOUR WIFE & QUESTION WHY YOU DIDN'T CONSIDER LONG-TERM CARE INSURANCE WHICH IS EXPENSIVE-BUT ALMOST NECESSARY AS WE GET INTO OUR 60'S & ABOVE TO PROTECT EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR WIFE.GLAD TO HEAR THAT YOU'RE YOU BE BACK UP WITH CONFIDENCE TO GROW & PROSPER.KEEP UP THAT ATTITUDE. YOU ARE WRONG ABOUT ME BEING A CAREER LIFER AS I SERVED 7 YRS. WITH ONLY 2 ACTIVE DUTY. I WAS A 21 YR CAPITALIST INTENT ON MAKING MY OWN WAY WHICH I DID IN SALES MGMT WITH REYNOLDS METALS FOR 27 YRS WHERE I WAS FIRED AS THEY MERGED WITH ALCOA @ 55 YRS-TOO YOUNG TO REALLY RETIRE WITHOUT A PKG FOR FORCED RETIREMENT.THIS IS TO TALK ABOUT PERSONAL LIVES AS THE CHOICES WE MAKE INFLUENCE OUR POLITICAL BELIEFS AS I WAS A DEMOCRAT TURNED LIBERTARIAN TO REPUBLICAN. BY THE TIME WE BECOME A SOCIALIST REGIME I WILL PREDICT IN 2030 I WON'T GIVE A DAMN. I EITHER WILL BE CLOSE TO 90 & NOT GIVE A DAMN OR KNOW THE DIFFERENCE OR BE DEAD-I'VE HAD FAILURES IN LIFE-REBOUNDED-FAILED AGAIN-REBOUNDED AGAIN-IT'S ALL ABOUT ATTITUDE & NOT BLAMING OTHERS FOR FAILURES .THAT'S THE PROBLEM WITH SOCIALISM-YOU KNOW IT'S GREAT UNTIL YOU RUN OUT OF OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY-IF YOU HAVE ENVY YOU'LL NEVER SUCCEED-GERMANY &SCANDINAVIA IN TOTAL HAVE 89 MILLION PEOPLE,WE HAVE 350 MIL & HAVE AT LEAST 89 MILLION SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE-GERMANY/SCANDINAVIA ARE ALREADY COMPLAINING ABOUT THEIR SOCIALISTIC BENT- THE 10% OF ANYTHING WILL FUCK IT UP FOR THE REST. MY QUESTION IS "ARE YOU PART OF THAT 10%-I THINK YOU ARE.THAT IS MY FACTUAL OPINION

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 18:57:09

MATT CLEMER/ BomberBuck,You are obviously both career military guys and yet you both hate socialism - don't you both realize that the US Military is the ultimate socialism. In a socialism or the military, everyone in the same pay grade (regardless of whether you were a genius or a doofus) got the identical pay; you could f--k up and spend all of your money and still the military fed you, housed you and in two more weeks paid you, in a socialism or the military you got sick and you got treated whether you could afford it or not. Why hate something that you voluntarily spent your careers in.And don't shit yourself - I am down now - mostly because it cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars providing nursing home care for a paralyzed wife, And I made the big mistake of moving to West Virginia (where clannish behavior is the rule) , but I am resurrecting my business and I'll be back up (sorry, to spoil your image of me as a grumpy old loser). But this site is not to talk about our personal lives but to discuss trends in American life - and it is a scientific fact that America has become an oligarchy and too many Americans ar getting the short end of the stick and that bodes ill. Capitalism no longer serves the most people so it will die. You guys hold tight - you'll soon both be back in the socialism that sheltered you all of your lives.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-11 17:05:30

BB-THX YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE AS WELL-THE NAVY WAS ONE OF THE BEST EDUCATIONAL & LIFE EXPERIENCES. WHEN I SAW YOUR TAG OF BOMBER BUCK- I HAD AN IMMEDIATE CONNECTION WHEN I SAW YOUR TAG. I SERVED IN A TRAINING UNIT IN NAS JAX-FLA-I WAS THE ONLY ENLISTED MAN IN THAT DEPT. THERE ONLY WAS 4 OF US.THE LT. COMMANDER WAS THE DEPT HEAD-PATTON TYPE PERSONALITY-& 2 LT-ONE'S NAME WAS LT. STEVE KENYON-LIKENED TO STEVE CANYON AIR FORCE PILOT OF COMIC STRIP FAME-WE TAUGHT 12 PILOTS EVERY 2 WEEKS HOW TO DELIVER BOMBS/MISSLES-I WAS THE GOPHER BUT I NEEDED A SECRET CLEARANCE WHICH WAS GRANTED AFTER BACKGROUND CHECKS BY FBI. I REMEMBER SIGNING THE TERMS/CONDITIONS THAT STATED ANY VIOLATION-MORAL OR OTHERWISE WAS IMMEDIATE REMOVAL FROM THAT DEPT & POSSIBLE INCARCERATION .IT BOTHERED ME WHEN HILARIOUS CLINTON HAD A PERSONAL SERVER & ABUSED THE PRIVILEGE WITH THE MISSING 20,000 E-MAILS & NO CRIMINAL ACTION WAS TAKEN. I LIKE TO THINK THAT WAS ONE OF THE REASONS SHE LOST THE ELECTION-I STILL THINK ABOUT THE HUNDREDS OF ROOKIE PILOTS THAT CAME THRU THE TRAINING & MADE IT THRU THE VIETNAM ERA AS THIS WAS 1964-68 WHEN THE WAR WAS ESCALATING -AF PILOTS DID A HELL OF LOT OF BOMBING AS WELL I'M SURE YOU HAVE STORIES OF YOUR TIME IN THE SERVICE. AGAIN I SALUTE YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE & STAY WELL WITH YOUR FAMILY.

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 11:55:05

RV-YOU KEEP MENTIONING THIS SO CALLED ECONOMIST-JOSEPH STIGLITZ-HE'S AN INTELLECTUAL IDIOT-IF YOU READ HIS BOOKS & BOUGHT HIS BS-HE THANKS YOU. AS A COLLEGE PROFESSOR @ COLUMBIA HE'S HIGHLY OVERATED @ THE DEMOTURD SCHOOL-HE'S AS MUCH OF A COMMUNIST AS A SOCIALIST AND A IDIOT SAVANT

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 10:48:12

MATT CELMER,Save your voice with this guy, I am. richardvajs (RV) is old, bitter and locked onto the mistaken idea that America is responsible for the World's woes (and now it seems, from his responses to you below, his personal woes as well). He's admitted to having received a college education in a technical field and having started a successful business thanks to the umbrella of freedom, prosperity, and opportunity America provides (this occurred during the time he claims to have been a republican/libertarian). It appears he then made a series of huge mistakes in his life (moving to West Virginia and then remaining there, etc.) which cost him his business and most of his personal prosperity. The idea of America is to provide equal opportunity--to succeed of fail--not equal outcome. RV doesn't blame his own choices for his woes, but thinks somehow America is at fault...and if America is responsible, then America is bad, then America must be taken down, America must fail. He pines for a future where America is consumed by anarchists and Antifa-like groups...with him up on the barricade laughing and gloating at those who didn't heed his warning. Yep, there's something not right with this fellow. He has "issues." It hard say if his "issues" caused him to become a liberal/leftist/socialist or his change in politics caused his "issues."

I see you served in the Navy. Thank you for your service and have a blessed and peaceful Veterans Day.

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-11 09:32:26

MATT CELMER,You are right in one aspect - West Virginia is not a good place to move to. I couldn't get good employees, and when I used up all of my funds, no one would hire me. The locals fear and hate anyone who was not born here. Most of my funds got used up because my wife had a massive stroke, and wound up in nursing homes for 12 years - ergo, my enthusiasm for national health care - 12 years of nursing home care could bankrupt a George Soros.I am glad for you that life has turned out so prosperous for you - millions are not so lucky. And those millions will be soon joined by millions more as America loses its empire and the fiat dollar is rejected by the World. I'm more into trading political opinions, but I figure that you are another shallow well, so I'll spare my breath. You and BomberBuck are more into insults and Republican platitudes that maybe carried a little weight 50 years ago, but are empty now. Maybe, I'll see you and Buck when the barricades go up - on the other side of course!

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-11 06:00:30

BB-HOPE YOUR SERMON GETS RV OUT OF HIS DOLDRUMS-SOME PEOPLE ARE SHEEP & WILL BE SHEARED-IF THEY DON'T KNOW HOW TO MOVE-I'D BE WILLING TO BET HE WAS ALWAYS A NEGATIVE PERSON BLAMING OTHERS FOR HIS FAILURES-MAYBE HE'LL SEE THE LIGHT

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 01:11:14

RV-YOU NEED SOME MENTAL HELP- 1ST Q-WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU MOVE TO RURAL WEST V-HOPEFULLY YOU WERE ABLE TO BAIL OUT OF YOUR BUSINESS WITHOUT TOO MUCH LOSE-SOUNDS LIKE BAD MGMT TO ME BUT I'M JUST SAYING-I'M 74-RETIRED @ 70-NEVER MADE MORE THAN 100K-BUT MAKE THE MOST MONEY IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW-INVESTMENTS-401K DIVIDENDS-IRA-ROTH IRA SS-CO PENSION -WORKED 61 YRS-NO DEBT -HAD 3 HOMES-SOLD 2 @ THE RIGHT TIME-DOWNSIZED TO A CONDO-SERVED IN THE NAVY-USE THE VA-MEDICARE PROGRAMS-OWN 2 LATE MODEL CARS-LIFE IS GOOD-GO TRUMP UNTIL 2024

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 00:58:57

BB-SORRY-I'M GOING TO PLAGIARIZE MOST OF YOUR COMMENTS TO ALL THE OTHER DEMOTURDS AS I TROLL THEIR SITES FOR DISCUSSIONS-FANTASTIC COMMENTARY-I'LL GIVE YOU MOST OF THE CREDIT THOUGH!

BB-WELL STATED-RV IS ALREADY ONE OF THOSE PIGS-SUDDENLY I'M GETTING A CRAVING FOR PORK-RIBS-BBQ-PULLED PORK;THAT SORT OF THING

Posted by MATT CELMER on 2018-11-11 00:15:28

Bomberbuck, Good luck to you also as you are totally blind to what is going on around you. Too bad, that you would never agree to it, but I'd love to meet up with you again in about five years time and see if you still have your Panglossian view on what is happening here in the USA. I will just state what I've said all along - inequality will destroy America, unless we go much more socialistic. I'll repeat a phrase from the 60s (the last great era in America) - you don't need to be a weatherman to tell which way the wind is blowing.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-10 18:14:40

The grass will always be greener on the other side of the fence (or Atlantic) for some because they choose to see themselves as victims instead of accepting responsibility for their own lives. People will always be envious of the accomplishments of others. but we shouldn't allow this minority of naysayers to destroy our societal fabric. There must be something great about America else I assume you and your family would have emigrated to one of your socialist paradises--which probably included Venezuela 5 years ago, but the grass isn't so green there anymore--already. BTW, I have a BS in Mathematics and a MS in Mechanical Engineering, but I'm not silly or deluded enough to claim my educational background allows me any special ability "...to see things as they are and not as I want them to be...." Using your logic, since I have 4,000+ hours flying operational and test missions from my 21-year US Air Force career...I must have the 50,000 foot "God's eye view" on economics, human nature, political science, etc. I make no such claim, nor would any sane person. We've already established you're not an Economist...but like to play one on social media. Now it seems you believe your degree (BS?) in Physics makes you Stephen Hawking incarnate. Give it a rest. I don't see this conversation going anywhere so I bid you auf wiedersehen, ha det, adiós, and do svidaniya (feel free to choose which suits you best).

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-10 10:40:35

BomberBuck, You are trying to make me a strawman for what you fear, which you want to wrap into a little bundle and call "Liberal". In my life, I have been comfortable and at times also not-so-comfortable. I do have a college degree in Physics - so I tend to see things as they are and not as I want them to be. And it has become a scientific fact that inequality has become established in America today. We have become the worst among developed countries as far as equal distribution of income. Wages have remained flat for the working class while virtually all new wealth, created recently, has gone to the wealthy. Under these conditions, it is like a unevenly loaded wagon - OK on a flat, straight line, but go around a steep curve and it topples.The average American no longer has the highest personal wealth in the World - "socialistic" countries like Germany and Scandinavia are way ahead of us, plus their citizens live longer and are healthier. The "Occupy Wall Street" mentality is a sign that other people (mostly the young, thinking types) have come to the same conclusion that capitalism has soured - instead of building factories and hiring people, the elites have been extracting wealth from our society. They are taking this wealth and hiding it in foreign bank accounts. I am not "gleefully predicting" America's downfall - I am sadly predicting it.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-10 07:17:35

I'm sorry you feel America has not treated you and your family well and not provided same with sufficient opportunity. I suppose you will live out your remaining years as a bitter ingrate instead of thanking your lucky stars that you and yours were born Americans. I was one of ten children and my wife was one of eight. Neither of our families were very well-to-do, but we worked hard (I started working when I was 14 and my wife when she was 15). We made something of ourselves by furthering our education in marketable fields, not Gender Studies or other useless degrees along those lines. By the way, I worked 20 hours per week while in college and she worked 2--and sometimes 3 jobs--to pay for her schooling. Our siblings made different choices with there lives which resulted in a full spectrum of outcomes which is contrary to your assumptions given our common backgrounds. Overly generous social welfare programs have robbed many people of any ambition to be successful, contributing members of society since they can achieve a subsistence level of support from the nanny state by remaining unemployed. The Occupy Wall Street mentality is to drag down other folks rather than work hard to better yourself. Americans now enjoy the highest standards of living in our 200+ history with almost everyone owning smartphones and big screen TVs. How about hoping America continues to succeed instead of gleefully predicting its downfall. Given the blessings you enjoy as outlined earlier, if find your attitude beneath contempt.

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-09 20:32:05

BomberBuck, That is just the run - every able-bodied citizen Does Not or No Longer has the opportunity to better themselves. In today's America where you wind up on the economic ladder of success depends mostly on where your parents are on the economic ladder of success. This is a fact proven by charts (from Joseph Stiglitz) that indicate that back in 1950, Americans born then had an average 75% chance of earning more than their parents, now it is less than 50%. America now has the largest income inequality amongst the other advanced countries, including Japan, UK, Germany, etc.You can believe the "happy horseshit" of American exceptionalism, if you want, but believe me, I have been around enough to know the cold truth of reality and reality says that America is going down hard. And good advice is- If you are doing Ok but everyone else around you is not doing OK, it won't be long before you won't be doing so OK yourself. Prosperity must be spread around or it won't be around long.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-09 18:52:17

Nope. Socialism/communism is not the answer. I prefer to live free in an country where every able-bodied citizen has the opportunity to better themselves. Sure, there will be inequality of outcomes because of variations in talent, work ethic, desire to achieve, etc. Here's an grownup concept to reflect upon...life is not fair. All socialism will do is allow government to grow so that it can control and dictate how we live our lives. There will be equality of misery with the notable exception of the privileged, ruling, political class. Worse for the world though, American exceptionalism and innovation will be but a shadow of its former itself.

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-09 16:31:15

BomberBuck,I am an old guy (76) and in my life I was a Republican at times and a Libertarian mostly. I was also an electronics engineer and had my own company of at most a dozen employees. I made a lot of money (as much as a million per year for awhile) and gave most of it to my employees. But, I now live in rural West Virginia and get to see poverty and discouragement daily. Team USA does not have a great future - wait until Team China and Team Automation run up the score on us. Inequality will destroy our society - you can't have guys making millions of dollars each year alongside folks pushing brooms for $9/hr. And no one is paying taxes - the rich won't and the poor can't. There is no future for America except as a more socialistic country. I remember when rich guys paid 80% taxes - now, they pay zilch. You don't have to believe me - get a November copy of Scientific American and read what Nobel winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz has to say about how inequality is destroying America. More socialism is our only hope.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-09 16:05:46

richardvajs - Your continuing histrionics cloud your judgment, but I do agree with you that many (most? all?) large, longtime, democrat-controlled American cities are now rundown and decrepit shells of themselves (think Detroit) or disgusting, immoral hell holes--a la San Francisco--due to decades of failed liberal/socialist policies. To embrace socialism would just throw more fuel on the fire of the Left-wing politics that are threatening the freedom, prosperity, and opportunity-for-all that is the United States...but there are undoubtedly misguided or disturbed individuals who have the destruction of America as their goal so they are preparing marshmallows skewers instead of helping control the fire.Finally, I suspect you're not really an Economist, but you like to play one on social media...so forgive me if the only mobs I fear are not the imagined ones you describe, but instead are comprised of anarchists and radical socialist who masquerade as anti-fascists while acting like fascists. Give up your communist/socialist dreams and rejoin Team USA for the big win!

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-09 15:07:38

BomberBuck,The "wild pigs" looking for free corn are the rich capitalists that want the benefits of a modern country but don't think that they should have to pay taxes to keep that country modern. In the last 20 years, the majority of the increases in the GDP have gone to the richest 1% of our population and, meanwhile our country has become a third-World crap-hole with a crumbling infra-structure; a discouraged working class - too dependent upon drugs; and a nation deep in debt. Thanks to the recent tax cuts for the rich, our federal operating budget has a trillion dollars annual deficit. Of course, the rich want to plug that hole by cutting Social Security benefits for the old, of whom virtually all are too old to go get a second job to make ends meet. What me and my ilk want is another New Deal, which kept this country going in the depth of the Depression. We don't want a Venezuela, which is just an other dictatorship - calling itself a socialist country. We do want another Scandinavia or Germany, which are both much more socialistic than our crony capitalism. A nation that really does provide opportunity for all and not just the trust babies who inherit it all. Inequality has become the bane of this country ever since the idiots like Reagan and G W Bush who believed the utter bullshit we could keep this country going by using only the military. Even scientific publications like Scientific American, are publishing serious articles how this inequality is destroying us.Don't worry about MY histrionics - you need to worry about the mobs in the street when the next depression hits. And a depression is coming - the dirty birds of our exploitation of World are coming home to roost - and those birds are already on the wing.

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-09 11:29:12

richardvajs - Please stop with the histrionics and exaggerations. The report above--which I did read--said they still were able to vote. You may have missed that part. To wit, "In Snellville, some machines poll workers use to check in voters didn't have power cords and ran out of batteries. Paper ballots were handed out for about 15 minutes before the issue was resolved." Also, there are scores more examples of democrat operatives committing voter fraud than republicans every voting cycle, but you already knew that.

I served in the armed forces and defended this Country for over two decades--mostly from foreign socialists and communists--and I plan to be around for a good long time to continue the fight--through voting--to keep her free. It saddens me to think you and your ilk prefer Venezuelan-style socialism to American freedom and prosperity.

However you do raise a valid concern about the insidious nature of socialism, so Americans need to be vigilant and heed the warning from the following parable:"You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come every day to eat the free food.When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence.They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side.The pigs, which are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat that free corn again. You then slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd.Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity.This is what's happening in America & Canada. The government keeps pushing us toward Communism/Socialism and keeps spreading the free corn out in the form of programs such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned income, tax exemptions, tobacco subsidies, dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP), welfare entitlements, medicine, drugs, etc., while we continually lose our freedoms, just a little at a time."​​

Posted by BomberBuck on 2018-11-09 09:31:17

BomberBuck, Did you even read some of the above reports? When election officials don't even plug in the election booth machinery to get AC power and instead let the machinery run on back-up battery power (which probably can only last a couple of hours in service) until it fails; then what you've got is criminal fraud or negligence at best. BomberBuck, - you should hope that your time in this country is short because, otherwise, you are going to have a long future watching "radically" fair ideas and candidates succeeding - well beyond your regressive dreams. Your future is socialistic - suck it up, Buck!

Posted by richardvajs on 2018-11-09 07:55:24

I think I heard it called TDS.

Posted by David Gentile on 2018-11-08 09:18:39

Some real brain trusts here: "we lost key races in TX, FL and GA because of racism and voter suppression and neofascism and Trumpism and sexism and transphobia and misogyny and yada, yada, yada"...yeah, sure you did. You lost those races due to radically bad ideas and candidates.